In the recent past, Patient Safety and Malpractice issues have caused contentious debates in the public domain. Numerous researchers have concluded that many people die as a result of preventable medical errors. Many people have expressed fear of not getting better care due to lack of safety and malpractice within the healthcare facilities (Schwartz, 2012). How care is delivered has been changed by unexplained incidences and numerous medical errors. Despite efforts made by the government to improve patient outcome and how care is delivered in health sectors, patients are still suffering in many health facilities from adverse events. This issue regarding health care is of interest to since health care is essential in the society, furthermore this issue has been the cause of thousands of lives some which go unnoticed hence without an intervention being made, I or my family member may need health care services and am afraid they may be among the victims, furthermore millions of dollars are lost annually in lawsuits.
The issue of patient safety and malpractice has to be sorted out. Annually, health care professionals make errors that are not supported to be made given their status and the sensitivity of human lives (Patient Safety, 2015). These errors lead to the death of thousands if not in millions of American patients annually. According to research, 90,000 deaths at $4.5 billion in hospital healthcare costs were caused by two million healthcare-associated conditions in the U.S. Each year, billions of dollars are paid for preventable, unplanned, readmissions and hospital admission costs by both private and Medicare payers. Prolonged illness or pain, distress and income loss from the medical errors are some of the anguish that both patients and their families experience. This issue is costing pain to many people hence something should be done to ensure no one experiences such pain. Ignoring patient safety in health centres is a disaster and action should be taken on health care providers who indulge in such acts. Furthermore, this issue is a nationwide dilemma that requires a public policy to ensure such stressful occurrences are evaded.
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Billions of dollars are lost yearly by the healthcare sector from claims of Medical malpractice, however, these this sector loses more than just money as it also losses its credibility. These issues often reflect negatively on the health centre as its reputation comes in questions and staff morale also decreases. The leadership of these health care centres often becomes demoralized as they cannot match what they say about the reputation of their health centres.
A comprehensive review of the clinics is often required when cases of medical malpractice occurred. The evaluation of corporate responsibilities of the hospitals involved in the matter is often overlooked while the clinical issues are always analyzed (Oshel & Levitt, 2016). The hospitals are said to be included in the issue when claims are made, hence it is recognized as corporate negligence as a contributing issue
Importantly, there is a dependency by the physicians for their hospital to effectively manage their risk management program. The medical malpractices can often be avoided through the hospital adhering to the required medical standards. It is also the responsibility of the medical staff within a hospital to ensure the care delivered is up to appropriate standards. Hospitals ought to put in place a risk management program. Since this issue is a national issue, a policy should be put in place. For this issue to be solved effectively, distributive policies are required. The distributive policy will ensure the way health care is provided from one health centre to another are similar and are of quality standards.
A distributive policy is essential and ensures distribution of resources and benefits is equitable. In healthcare, distribution policy will ensure vital medical resources like intensive care machines are evenly distributed in every health centre. There are instances where patient safety and malpractice occur due to lack of proper training of the medical staff, lack of exposure and the staff may not be fully aware on how to use the machines used in the healthcare sector (Patient Safety, 2015). Therefore distributive policy will be beneficial to each and every health center as it will allow for regular training, exchange programs between medical staff to exchange ideas on various health issues and how to handle them, technological equipment will also be equally distributed and the staff trained on how to use them to avoid cases of errors during care provision.
This policy should be addressed by the federal state. This follows as some states may be fully equipped with state of the art equipment to take care of any challenge while others may be lagging behind, the irony is that these two states may be experiencing the same health problems. This will leave one state prone to medical errors and malpractices while the other will be fully equipped to handle such challenges hence one state will constantly find itself facing numerous lawsuits. When issues of patient safety are addressed by state governments, the effects will not be uniform throughout the nation, since this is a national issue, it should be fully addressed by the national government, this way the effects will be the same everywhere.
To ensure the government addresses this issue, it is important that media is used to air these malpractice and patient safety issues. Using media will get the attention of every stakeholder to want to effect change. The issue of patient safety and malpractice has caused numerous debates as the number of casualties and lawsuits that have been filed cannot go without being noticed (Schwartz, 2012). This issue will originate from the judicial arm of the government to the executive. This is due to the numerous lawsuits that are filed almost on a daily occasion. This policy needs to be fresh to ensure it comes with the full force of the law. A new policy is vital and comes with a lot of force that will ensure adoption of equality within the health department is embraced. This policy will see a reduction of malpractices country wide hence a reduction in lawsuits and reduced mortality as a result of enhanced care.
Patient safety and malpractice is a violation of the patients' rights according to the law. Ensuring this policy passed by the government will need a lot of work. This era is an era in which no mistakes pass without the public noticing hence various organizations like the human rights commission. This organization fights for public welfare. Apart from this organization, there are numerous NGOs that ensure the rights of the citizens are not violated, these include organizations like American Equal Rights Association and Amnesty International. In this plan, I will use the services of these organizations to ensure this issue is well addressed and articulated effectively. These organizations are essential and will be vocal and push for this issue at the national level.
These organizations are vocal and have an influence. Through corporation with these organizations, there is very little I will have to do since they are more influential compared to me. Leaving this issue in the hands of these organizations will force the government to take action since failure to taking action will lead to massive outrage and legal action. These organizations are also well connected to ensure this issue goes through to the government. Additionally, they are well equipped in terms of resources and legal mechanisms to facilitate its effectiveness. Since this issue touches on the lives of humans and has caused severe pain and numerous deaths throughout the nation, it will not take a lot of efforts for it be heard by the government and other like-minded politicians to push for it to be discussed in the Congress.
Knowing the right person to approach in the government to articulate certain issues may prove a bit challenging. However, with the right strategy, it becomes easy. Throughout the U.S, health care issues are regarded dearly by the general population. Therefore patient safety issue is an issue that affects everyone in the country hence should be fixed using channels that would enhance equality. Therefore the following actions are necessary to get adequate support from politicians;
Control the ground: the best way to ensure a lobby is won is to ensure focus is made on the politicians who can easily be swayed and not on those who are hardliners whose stand cannot be changed easily. This will ensure more support is achieved. Through making this move, those who disagree with the issue will seem peripheral and unnecessary when there is a premature ending to the discussion.
Turn the media: when there are more clamours, lobbyists seem to have few controls. Therefore the press seems to be the best tool to be used to push for this agenda. This tool makes it possible for communication with the government.
Neutralize the opposition: to pass across the message, it is necessary to silence opposition, this way the government can only listen to our demands. Reducing the level of opposition will reduce numerous critics.
Open the door: since politicians are in charge of the government, I will ensure to relate well to them. I will bring them closer; hence this will open numerous avenues for various opportunities.
Patient safety and malpractice issue ought to be effectively solved to limit the numerous lawsuits that health care centres face regularly. The errors caused by the health professionals may not be necessary due to their liking but as a result of inadequate exposure, lack of proper mechanism to combat various health issues that arise every day. Whether these actions are deliberate or not, the lives of many people are at risk and this issue must be solved to evade these challenges. High-reliability organizations use improvement tools in an effort to achieve zero patient harm, and a change in safety culture, these actions only show an insight into leadership in commitment (Robust Process Improvement, 2015). Additionally, high-reliability organization solves performance problems in an organization by using indicators after discovering threats. The organization ensures that it analyzes the potential threats to the organization before it causes harm.
This issue needs the intervention of the federal government to ensure all states have a policy that is similar throughout the country. Having a similar policy is vital to future of health care. It is necessary to make great changes in the healthcare sector since patient safety has greatly been compromised. Therefore using a distributive public policy is necessary and is the best solution to counter this issue facing health care. The distributive public policy will ensure every health benefit is distributed equaling in every state's health centre. Equality is a major issue that must be taken into account since it would be unfair to solve the patient safety and malpractice issue in other states while others continue to face the same challenges (Patient Safety, 2015).
The judicial arm of the government has seen numerous suits filed due to patient safety and related malpractice issues. This government branch has witnessed numerous suits filed against the health sector. However, the judicial sector must always act fairly and just hence the only thing it can do is advice the executive branch to do something to reduce the litigation issues.
The federal government should implement a distributive policy throughout the country. The policy implemented should be able to ensure every health centre throughout the country has state of the art medical facilities. Additionally, the personnel must be highly trained to facilitate effective and efficient care delivery. Exchange programs must be encouraged throughout the country and regular training be conducted for all healthcare staff to ensure they polish on their skills regularly to avoid any malpractice issue. Furthermore, constant reviews should be conducted to check what needs to be changed or added to ensure patient safety is given a priority. Finally, these measures should be mandatory in every health centre.
Conclusion
Patient safety of great importance in the health sector and should be treated as such. Healthcare professionals make errors that are not supported to be made given their status and the sensitivity of human lives. These errors lead to the death of thousands if not in millions of American patients annually. This issue is costing pain to many people hence something should be done to ensure no one experiences such pain. These issues often reflect negatively on the health centre as its reputation comes in questions and staff morale also decreases. The medical malpractices can often be avoided through the hospital adhering to the required medical standards. The hospitals are said to be included in the issue when claims are made, hence it is recognized as corporate negligence as a contributing issue.
A distributive policy is essential and ensures distribution of resources and benefits is equitable. The medical malpractices can often be avoided through the hospital adhering to the required medical standards. The distributive policy will be beneficial to each and every health center as it will allow for regular training, exchange programs between medical staff to exchange ideas on various health issues and how to handle them, technological equipment will also be equally distributed and the staff trained on how to use them to avoid cases of errors during care provision. Patient safety is vital and should be given a priority within the sector.
References
Oshel, R., & Levitt, P. (2016). The Detection, Analysis, and Significance of Physician Clustering in Medical Malpractice Lawsuit Payouts. Journal Of Patient Safety , 1. doi: 10.1097/pts.0000000000000326
Patient Safety: National Quality Forum. (2015). Retrieved November 29, 2015 from,
http://www.qualityforum.org/Topics/Patient_Safety.aspx
Robust Process Improvement. The Center for Transforming Healthcare (2015). Retrieved
November 30, 2015, from http://www.centerfortransforminghealthcare.org/about/rpi.aspx
Schwartz, J. (2012). Malpractice Litigation, Patient Safety, and the Changing Culture of Risk. SSRN Electronic Journal . doi: 10.2139/ssrn.2104964
